Pages

Wednesday, May 11, 2011

Project Flashback: Scraping with Newsprint

In May- June 1999 I took a trip to Italy with my twin sister's college art class. Long story short, the two professors were friends of the family and were really nice to let me tag along. We spent 21 days traveling all over Italy painting and riding our bikes for a couple of Art and PE college credits. Let me just say, this trip was amazing. We saw so many fantastic buildings, scenery, history and museums. Amazing in other ways as well: my sister and I had not gotten along through our teen years, but I believe this trip was a turning point in our relationship. Today she's one of my closest friends.

When we got home I spent a LOT of my summer scrap booking my photos. This was before I really knew anything about "scrapbooking" papers and accessories. At the time, I hated my handwriting but wanted to label the pictures of places we saw. The idea was to clip words/ letters out of magazines. It took forever to get just the right combination but it turned out fantastic.

After I finished this Album, I was super excited to show it off. Almost twelve years later, I'm still excited about it and happy to be sharing it with you. Which says a lot cause I can be my own worst critic! I also wasn't finished using newsprint to make art. I eventually finished these pieces for an art show. All the painting was water color or gauche paint. Halfway through the trip I learned I could use a pen to draw over the paint to define my edges. It seems rather intuitive but it took a painting lesson and watching the art professor at work to figure that out.

I'm not really a painter, in fact you can see a few of my "Best" paintings in the above photos. Below are some of the actual student artist's work. Believe you me, I felt even worse about my painting skills seeing my pieces next to theirs. I was going to school for computer stuff, and they had spent a whole year before the trip studying art. Oh well, I had fun and learned to appreciate a new craft medium.